Central storyline
Each episode began with the following introduction, plus a recap of the storyline:
"Power on". Actor Timothy Dunigan, outfitted in his character's full regalia (one of the "Power Suits" of exoskeletal armor that Robert Short Productions created for the show), turned to the camera and delivered this line.
Voiceover artist Brad Crandall:
Captain Power and the Soldiers of the Future
Earth, 2147. The legacy of the Metal Wars, where man fought machines—and machines won.
Bio-Dreads—monstrous creations that hunt down human survivors... and digitize them.
Volcania, center of the Bio-Dread Empire; stronghold and fortress of Lord Dread (David Hemblen), feared ruler of this new order.
But from the fires of the Metal Wars arose a new breed of warrior, born and trained to bring down Lord Dread and his Bio-Dread Empire.
They were "Soldiers of the Future"--mankind's last hope.
Their leader--Captain Jonathan Power (Dunigan), master of the incredible Power Suits, which transform each soldier into a one-man attack force.
Major Matthew 'Hawk' Masterson (Peter MacNeill), fighter in the skies.
Lieutenant Michael 'Tank' Ellis (Sven-Ole Thorsen), ground assault unit.
Sergeant Robert 'Scout' Baker (Maurice Dean Wint), espionage and communications.
And Corporal Jennifer 'Pilot' Chase (Jessica Steen), tactical systems expert.
Together they form the most powerful fighting force in Earth's history.
Their creed: to protect all life. Their promise: to end Lord Dread's rule.
Their name: Captain Power and the Soldiers of the Future!
By the year 2132, advanced robotic soldiers known as "Bio-Mechs" had replaced humans in the armed forces of the world's nations. The existence of Bio-Mechs meant that wars could be fought without significant loss of life, allowing turning war into a nearly harmless battle between machines. A group of scientists, led by Dr. Stuart Gordon Power (Bruce Gray), had begun working on an advanced supercomputer, called OverMind, capable of overriding the control systems which the world's armed forces used to operate the Bio-Mechs, and thus stop them, bringing an end to war. It required an equivalent to human brain patterns to become operational. But Dr. Power's closest associate, Dr. Lyman Taggart (David Hemblen), became impatient with the slow pace of the project and hooked himself up to the system, bringing the supercomputer to operational status.
With the new opportunities offered by the human-machine combination, Taggart becomes obsessed with the precision and "perfection" of machines and convinces himself that merging human consciousness with mechanical bodies is the next step in human evolution. OverMind achieves self-awareness and shares Taggart's beliefs as they take over Bio-Mech armies throughout the world and attack humanity in a conflict known as the Metal Wars.
World governments turn to Dr. Power for find a way to stop Taggart. He develops the "Power Suits", a combination of exoskeletal body armor and advanced weapons and prepares a number of prototypes for testing. However, Power apparently dies trying to rescue his son Jonathan from Taggart, though Jonathan is convinced that his father is still alive somewhere. Taggart himself is severely wounded, and OverMind saves him by implanting cybernetic mechanisms into his body, eventually calling himself Lord Dread.
By 2147, fifteen years after the Metal Wars broke out, humanity had been largely annihilated by Lord Dread's forces, and those who survive live miserable existences in hiding lest they be discovered by Bio-Mechs and "digitized" as virtual beings within OverMind. Advanced Bio-Mechs called Bio-Dreads and humans loyal to Dread carry out the extermination, as Dread rules from his headquarters in Volcania, somewhere in North America. In episode 8 "And Study War No More", the location of Volcania is announced as being in "sector 9 by 6". The computer map shows its location near the Great Lakes region of North America.
Despite the dire situation, a number of human forces band together and fight the Bio-Dread Empire. One of the leading human resistance groups, Jonathan Power's "Power Team", uses his father's Power Suits to mount attacks on Bio-Dread forces. They stage out of the "Power Base", an abandoned NORAD installation in the Rocky Mountains, and are guided by a supercomputer programmed with Mentor, an artificial intelligence designed by Dr. Power in his own image and voice to guide his son and the group. It is later revealed that there are human resistance groups in other locations.
"Project New Order"
During the show's only season, there was a story arc involving Project New Order, Lord Dread's plan to eradicate human life and develop his ideal world. The plan consisted of four stages:
- Styx, the release of a powerful toxin into the human population.
- Charon, the creation of an advanced Bio-Dread warrior force.
- Icarus, the construction of a massive orbital platform capable of large-scale digitizing.
- Prometheus, the release of a plasma storm capable of scorching the Earth's surface.
Captain Power's group uses a system of teleportation portals, called "transit gates", both to move quickly around North America and to keep their base's location secret. However, at the conclusion of the first season, Lord Dread breaks the gates' access codes and sends forces to assault the base. Power and most of his team escape the facility, but Corporal Jennifer "Pilot" Chase, a former member of the "Bio-Dread Youth", is trapped and activates the base's self-destruct mechanism, killing herself and the Bio-Dread troops.
J. Michael Straczynski was the writer of the last episode of the series. He commented about Pilot's death, revealing that the scene was inspired by an especially tragic event in his own past:[5]
"I've never talked about this before—said I was in a thoughtful mood—but I've known several people, friends, who've taken their own lives. In one case, I spoke to her just beforehand. Tried, through the phone lines, to reach her one more time, pull her back from the edge. I couldn't. Years pass. Time comes for me to write the last filmed episode of Power".
He also added:
"Jennifer Chase is going to die, partly of her injuries, partly of her own volition. Part of my life went into that scene, in the way it was constructed, and what was said. And what was not said, what never had the chance to be said, and thus still burns. I knew that, at the crucial moment of that scene, he couldn't be near her, as I wasn't near my friend...it had to be long-distance, hearing but not seeing her, and the terrible pain of arriving too late. I cannot watch that episode without crying. Ever".
Proposed second season
The second season focuses on an anguished Captain Power neglecting his duties as the leader of the team and obsessed with killing Dread and Locke, the slicer who had betrayed them in the previous season finale, to avenge Pilot's death. Major Hawk would have assumed more leadership roles as Power goes off on his vendetta. Two characters were to have been introduced: Chris "Ranger" O'Connor, a woman who would be Tank's love interest; and Private Chip "TNT" Morrow, a soldier who had appeared in the first season under the name of Andy Jackson.
The plot also covered the team's quest to find "Eden II", a supposed secret human refuge mentioned in the first season, while setting up a base of operations on a facility that was the prototype of the Power Base. Lord Dread would have gained a new mechanical form, as actor David Hemblen was not required back except, perhaps, for voice work. His new army would have consisted of "Hunter-Seeker" troops and a new Warlord-class Bio-Dread called Xenon. Dread would also have gained a new assistant called Morgana II, a machine with the mind of his former lover – who would have proven to be Jonathan Power's mother.
OverMind would have taken a larger role in the war and revealed a hidden agenda: after digitizing all the remaining human beings, it would erase them from existence. Wanting to keep this secret from Dread, the plot would have seen the AI give Soaron secret programming to assassinate Lord Dread in case he suspected anything.
In the recent DVD release, series head writer J. Michael Straczynski reveals that the planned end for the series was Lord Dread learning of OverMind's hidden agenda, and as a result, teaming up with Captain Power to free all of humanity from OverMind.
Adult storyline
A great majority of the show's story line was filled with romance and intrigue, which was made for the adults who watched the show with their children. Thus, the story was filled with romantic kisses, sexual innuendo, and occasionally scenes which implied sexual encounters between characters. Mild profanity was also present; "damn" was said on at least one occasion, and Pilot told Blastarr to "go to hell" in response to his order to surrender. In addition, the violent death of one of the major ongoing characters in the series (detailed above) was also an unusual development for a children's series. The inclusion of a "Bio-Dread Youth", which recruited young survivors to Lord Dread's ideals to further advance his agenda, also paralleled fascist regimes.
Criticism and cancellation
Captain Power attempted to appeal to both children and adult audiences, with its dark, post-apocalyptic storyline showing the aftermath of nuclear war and featured allegories on topics such as Nazism.[1][6][7] Ultimately, this became the show's undoing. It was seen as too violent for children because of its toys for shooting at the television and live-action violence. Its less mature aspects, such as the title, drove away adult audiences. Other factors contributing to the show's failure included the higher cost of a live-action show (each episode cost an estimated $1 million to produce) compared to the cheaper production costs of a cartoon, as well as the fact that the gameplay between the show and the toys was extremely poor. Poor transmission time-slot choices also contributed to the show's cancellation: it was sold to syndication as opposed to a regular network time-slot, which resulted in some television stations airing it in the 5:00-6:00 AM time-slot on Sunday mornings. The subsequent poor ratings hastened the show's demise. In an article from Starlog #128 written by Marc Shapiro with quotes from one of the writers of the show, Larry DiTillio, there are the following statements:
But for all those noble sentiments, Captain Power, to the public at large, is perceived as just another excuse to sell toys. It is a notion that rubs story editor Larry DiTillio the wrong way.
"We're not writing stories with the idea of turning each episode of Captain Power into a video game", declares DiTillio. But DiTillio, a first season staff writer who became story editor when J. Michael Straczynski (Starlog #111) left the position for a similar post with the revived Twilight Zone, claimed that ramrodding the script side of Captain Power hasn't been easy.
"This show has definitely not made my life easier", chuckles DiTillio. "This is not just another kid's cartoon show. The writing is always to an adult level. There is the interactivity which has been centered mainly in the battle sequences but we aren't in a position of having to write X amount of animation and interactivity into each episode. I want to make it very clear that around here, we're working for the story".
There is a tone of desperation in DiTillio's voice as he defends the writing integrity of Captain Power. It's a desperation resulting from dealing with cliché story submissions that have come streaming in amid the confusion about how childlike or adult Captain Power is. "People are coming in with the same old stories", DiTillio laments. "I'm getting Star Trek, Star Wars and Terminator. If I wanted another Terminator, I would call James Cameron".[8]
Matthew J. Costello was critical of the show in 1988: "Not only is the 'show' a thirty-minute ad for the toys (as is He-Man and the many other toy-based programs), but Captain Power sets up two classes of viewers — those who have a collection of the toys (which interact with the program during a special five-minute segment), and those who don't".[9]
In a subsequent Starlog article a year after the cancellation, DiTillio cited many reasons for Mattel cutting off the show's funds, resulting in the show's cancellation: "Mattel's tie-in toys didn't sell up to expectations, parents group charges that the show was too violent, and having to shell out Screen Actors Guild and Writers Guild residual payments because Captain Power was live-action".[10]
J. Michael Straczynski commented about the show's cancellation and the planned second season.
Re: Captain Power "...Yeah, that's a show that is an example of what to strive for, and how sometimes good intentions can get derailed. We genuinely wanted to come up with a long-term story, and by and large, we succeeded. The problem was the marketing in front of the show, and the merchandising behind the show...we got killed from both sides".
"There's an entire second season of unproduced CP scripts, story edited by Larry DiTillio, in which he follows up on the arc that I and others established during the first season. You would have found out what Dread became, what happened to Power's mother, where Eden was (and there would be direct contact), what the secret was in Soaron's programming, and so on".[11]
In 1987, Captain Power was one of the targets of anti-toy related children's television advocates who claimed that the series focused on selling children expensive toys for full participation.[12] For British viewing, the BBC and the commercial ITV network as well as its stations gave them thumbs down on the series, so they enabled the British cable channel Super Channel to pick up the series, despite the fact they have lobbying from the distributors, which was set to air beginning in 1988, given by the fact the present climate on Britain over sex, violence and commercialism in programming.[13]
